Two Teenagers in Hongkou Awarded

By Gu Li

The top 10 primary and middle school students (secondary vocational students) and the 100 “Excellent Teenagers in New Era” in 2018-2019 have been awarded.

Hongkou has two selected to get the award.

Taking Good Care of the Elderly

Majoring in hotel operation and service at Shanghai South Lake Vocational School, Tang Jun has owned arrays of certificates of honor, including the First Scholarship, the Third Prize in Tourism Vocational Skills Competition and Triple-A Student, and the greatest one is the “Excellent Teenagers in New Era”.

Tang is only 17 years old, but he is more mature than his peers, which results from that he has taken care of his grandma since junior middle school. Due to his parents’ heavy work, Tang moves to live with and take care of his grandma after his grandpa died in 2012.

Different from other students, it is foremost for Tang to buy food and do the cooking but not doing his homework at home after school every day; and Tang will take the initiative to wash dishes after they finishing the meals. During the winter and summer holidays, Tang will take his grandma to the park for flower show. His grandma wants him go out to play with his classmates, but Tang thinks that she is usually alone at home and he should accompany her around during the holiday. Getting along with his grandma for a long time, Tang develops his good habit in being patient and careful, and enables himself to better listen to the elderly and to solve difficulties for them.

The class that Tang comes from sets up its volunteer service site at a nursing home near the school. Tang would like to chat with the elderly for a while after offering nursing services with his classmates, and his sense of humor often amuses the elderly of no family.

Once Tang saw an old man who has a trouble in walking changing the sheets, he offered help and used what he learned in professional classes to assist the old man who was moved then. Accompanying the elderly might be a waste of time, but Tang does not think so. According to him, he learns to be grateful in getting along with the elderly. It is more than a special job to teach him how to allocate the time evenly and make himself better.

Saving the Entire Building

Sheng Siyuan, who wins the "Integrity Award" in response to the 100 “Excellent Teenagers in New Era”, is a student from grade two of Shanghai Xinhua Private Junior High School. He has been a member of life committee, labor committee and health committee in his class, which impresses the teachers and students as well as the residents living in his building with being dependable and warmhearted.

Sheng, who went home at 22:00 on November 25, 2017, smelled burning and saw dense smog after taking the elevator to F20, which reminded him of the 119 fire drill held at school. To find the ignition point, Sheng knocked on doors on F20 to confirm whether the house was on fire, and immediately informed his neighbors of evacuating from the fire exit when he found out a serious open fire in the electrical room.

Afterwards, he ran to every floor and shouted to inform the residents that there was a fire. With mutual help, hundreds of households in the building were safely evacuated to the lobby before the fire spread. When the firemen arrived, Sheng told them the ignition point, and saved their time to put out the fire. Besides, the residents had fallen asleep when the fire started, so it would be definitely miserable without Sheng’s calm response. Thus, the residents expressed their gratitude to Sheng that “Thank you for protecting our lives and property.” Then, Sheng responded that "I'm just applying the fire-fighting knowledge I learned at school, which is all I should do."